‘Tell Me Lies’: Grace Van Patten, Jackson White Break Down Lucy & Stephen’s Season 2 Premiere Battles (VIDEO)

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[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Episodes 1 and 2 of Tell Me Lies Season 2.]

Lucy Albright (Grace Van Patten) is still down bad for Stephen DeMarco (Jackson White), whether she likes it or not, but she won’t let him know it. After he (very publicly) got back together with Diana (Alicia Crowder) in front of Lucy at the end of last semester, Lucy’s now attempting to move on with her life in Tell Me Lies Season 2. She returns to Baird with a fresh, post-Stephen outlook, but seeing Stephen again chisels the first cracks in her resolve. TV Insider spoke with Van Patten and White about Lucy and Stephen’s clashes in the first episodes of Season 2.

“I think when you first see her before she goes to school, she’s really convinced herself that she’s okay,” Van Patten said. “I think she’s completely in denial. I think she thinks she’s moved on and she’ll be OK this year. She’s going in with the goal of being a good friend and redeeming herself for last year. I think she instantly realizes that that is not the case when she sees Stephen for the first time, and that wall completely falls down on her, and she puts on a front and walks away. That’s when it all starts. That’s kind of what kicks it off.”

Disney / Josh Stringer

At the welcome party, Lucy and Stephen keep it somewhat cordial, but you can feel the tension simmering underneath their skin. There’s so much they want to say but don’t. “That’s why I love that scene so much because they’re really just saying pleasantries to each other, and it’s so much subtext beyond that,” the actress noted. “What they’re saying to each other could be between any two people, no matter what the relationship is. That’s why it was so fun to shoot. It was so loaded.

Stephen has done many manipulative things in his life, but he’s especially cruel to Lucy after their breakup. He sits down at the lunch table — in front of her new love interest Leo (Thomas Doherty) — and humiliates her just because he can.

“He probably just feels that she’s not in his grasp anymore, and he definitely [tries to] maintain some control and try and get the power seat back,” White said about Stephen’s behavior in that moment. “It’s always been a power dynamic. Who’s on top? Also, she has so much on him. She knows so much about him.”

Van Patten added, “Which is so crazy that he would test that. She holds the biggest secret, and she could ruin your life at any point. But I think there’s like the confidence of knowing that she won’t.” White quipped, “He must really know that she’s still down… She holds like a detonator on him, but he doesn’t give a s**t.”

White believes there’s a very specific reason why Lucy gets under his skin like no one else. “They complement each other’s crazy, but also, it’s kind of simple chemistry,” he told TV Insider. “The way I always looked at it, you don’t really know what’s going on with certain people, but you’re on this different frequency and you’re communicating different, and there’s almost a shorthand with these people. Sometimes, when you first meet these people, there’s a shorthand. I think you saw that from the jump from when they met each other at that frat party, like an instant, specific dynamic.”

Disney / Josh Stringer

In Episode 2, Lucy takes a stand against Stephen. She threatens to destroy his life if he keeps on twisting the knife in her back. If he doesn’t leave her alone, Lucy vows to expose Stephen’s secret: He was in the car with Macy the night she died. Even though Lucy holds his fate in her hands, Stephen will keep stoking the fire. “I think he goes game on,” White says of Stephen’s reaction to Lucy’s threat. “He is afraid of her, but he likes that. That’s what it is. He’s into that.”

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‘Tell Me Lies’: How Lucy's New Guy Leo Compares to Stephen & More Season 2 Scoop

Despite Stephen’s sadistic moves against her, Lucy is truly trying to move on from him. She crosses paths with a handsome fellow student named Leo, who is not interested in getting wrapped up in drama like Stephen is. This new romance isn’t going to be easy for Lucy as she deals with the fallout of her unhealthy connection with Stephen.

“That relationship is a really great way to show how you can be affected after a toxic relationship and how you can project past trauma onto a new person and kind of not take in the new person in front of you,” Van Patten said about Lucy and Leo. “It’s a lot of not trusting him and expecting him to do the same thing Stephen did and not being with him in the moment and then realizing, oh, this guy is vulnerable, and I haven’t experienced that yet. He’s sharing his trauma with me. He’s giving me the opportunity to understand him.”

She continued, “I think that was new for Lucy, but I don’t think she’s taking any of it in because she’s still so caught up with Stephen, which I think is such a smart way to show the effects of a toxic relationship.”

Tell Me Lies, Season 2, New Episodes, Wednesdays, Hulu